New Game+

Earlier that night, Harker called Lander and Cliff with an emergency ping.

Cliff was forced to end his conversation with Charm, much to his annoyance.

Cliff sat down with a disgruntled expression.

Seeker and Lander finally arrived.

"Well? How goes your mission?" Seeker laughed.

Cliff gave Seeker a strong glare. It was one of the rare times that he actually displayed it.

Seeker didn\'t seem bothered.

"You look like you had a good night." Harker laughed.

"You could say that. I am about eighty percent sure that this Lara is a Presider."

Lander, Harker, and Cliff suddenly froze.

"A Presider?"

"Specifically, she should be Zeraphine of the Presiders. The phrase \'of the Presiders,\' is a title bestowed on an Aragarian Presider which makes her either a nominal or an elected leader amongst Presiders." Seeker smiled.

"Then this is good news!"

Seeker gave a mysterious smile.

"Indeed it is. But because of this, we need to create distractions and intrigue. Now that a Presider is within our reach, we have to even increase the security, the conspiracy surrounding our camp."

"Increase it even more?" Lander frowned.

"You\'ve already created a new definition of paranoia. You all act and assume that someone else is listening to every conversation you have even when in public areas. And the areas where you do talk, you put various techs to soundproof, hack-proof, drone-proof and bug-proof it. "

"We will need to increase security but that\'s not what I mean. Harker, we will need to push our plans further. We need to create a distraction. They need to think that your organization is not what it appears. You understand what I\'m saying?"

"Create an undercover identity to hide our real one. I get it. So this is why you want to fire a rocket launcher towards the school?"

"Ri-Right." Seeker nodded hiding his hesitation.

"I see. We create chaos in this school by making it look like there are a lot of organizations after us… If they believe in the existence of that secret organization thanks to Lowengren and the Tyrant Empress, then they might help me. Impressive." Harker filled in the blanks.

Seeker had a strange expression.

"What? Do you have something better?"

"Erm… No. It\'s just that you thought exactly what I was thinking! Right!" Seeker laughed.

Harker was giving Seeker a probing look when Seeker turned to Cliff and Lander.

"You two will take part in this. With what Harker just explained, we need to put in a real act. It\'s better if you fought with Harker." Seeker spoke to Lander.

"An Exo battle? This will be fun. I\'ve always wanted to fight the Hero of Helion\'s Tragedy in this manner." Harker laughed.

Lander simply shook his head.

"What about me?"

"You\'ll be the one attacking the school. You are to shoot a rocket targeting Harker. I have a way of making Zeraphine look for me. Harker, you are to time your arrival at school tomorrow with hers. Cliff, schedule to meet Charm somewhere near the entrance. That way all three will coincide with their meeting."

"Wait… you want me to fire a rocket at them?"

"Don\'t worry about your girlfriend! Harker will protect her. Besides, it will be your hands guiding the rocket." Seeker smiled.

Cliff glared at Seeker.

"To think he\'s suddenly acting all brave. Towards the General of all people… Love does turn a soldier to a fool." Lander shook his head.

Seeker ignored Lander\'s strangely respectful comment.

"After launching the attack, I want you to retreat and disappear. Harker, when you are trying to look for his location, Lander will suddenly attack. Everyone will think that this is the same assassin."

"Oh? You\'re giving Cliff an easy mission?"

"No. It\'s a bit harder than you think. Did you recall Richie\'s words before he left? He could sense that a lot of eyes are on you. Wouldn\'t this be the best opportunity to bring them out?"

"How?" Harker pondered.

Seeker pointed to Cliff.

"Him of course. With all the eyes looking at us, we\'ll make sure that many will put their eyes on Cliff."

"You want to leak information about an assassin?"

"Yes. Make it appear that Australian tech has been detected in Pangea\'s Zone of Responsibility. And make it look like it\'s close here."

"You want people to think Australia is assassinating me?"

"Yes. They are the only country which we can pin to have created modified soldiers. Cliff will infiltrate the school without any technological enhancement. He can make it look like he used magnetic tech to launch a weapon over the school. But we\'ll just have it readied on the roof of the train station. Cliff will then escape. If you make a public appearance a few minutes before Cliff attacks, those eyes should be watching the area. They will detect Cliff. And even though it would appear that we had forces ready to cover the tracks of the assassin through Lander, these silent observers will see the truth and attack Cliff."

"You want me… to face them, without any technological assistance at all?"

"We can\'t use Pangean, Chinese, SPU, British or whatever we have. And if you carry any weapon with you that does not trigger the tech detection systems around the city, it would be suspicious." Seeker smiled.

"That\'s crazy! You\'re saying that its possible I\'ll be facing a troop of soldiers without any technological aid and I don\'t won\'t even know what techs my enemies will have?!"

"Yes. Who knows who will come. But who else can pull this off? Lynd and Meryl won\'t be in the area. I will be off to China and the rest are not just strong enough to do this. You have to do it on your own."

"Come on, Cliffy! You need this to help you prepare to face that guy! Consider this as training. You said that you managed to slow down time in an extremely detailed fashion. That\'s impossible even for me! If you want to survive your next mission and accomplish it perfectly… you need to improve that memory of yours!"

"What can my memory do?" Cliff argued.

"Come on, Cliff. You think you can fool me?" Seeker laughed.

The truth was, Cliff, did fool Seeker. Because Seeker never imagined just how powerful Cliff\'s memories had become.

Cliff hid it, in fear that Seeker would push him to even more terrible missions.

There would be no way to explain how Cliff did it. But this was something Cliff had been unconsciously doing for the past few months. It began as simply being able to memorize it. But Cliff wasn\'t all that all-knowing. The reason he could remember everything at once was that he had more time recalling things.

At first, all these things were working automatically in the background when Cliff would do battle. It was only when he faced the powerful Overcomer, Amir Mann, did he manage to forcefully take more conscious control of his automated acts.

He found himself in the world of his subconscious. It was similar to the method Seeker used when pushing his cells to achieve Surmounting Thought. But Cliff\'s version was far more powerful.

It was like he was in a dream-world. He existed inside this world and this world existed inside his brain. It was something that cannot be explained to beings who live in three dimensions. Even the fourth dimension which people live in only in a half-step, the dimension of time, was distorted here.

He had used this to great lengths during his interaction with Charm last night. He was so scared and petrified, that he would spend ten or so minutes in this dream world to think about what to respond to Charm\'s answer. He even used his knowledge of micro-expressions to see what Charm felt as he responded and even used that to change his sentences in the milliseconds of his answer.

Cliff looked around and noticed that his environment around him mimicked the surroundings he was in a few seconds ago. But this time, Gardo was not moving. For some reason, Cliff knew that this world he was seeing wasn\'t real.

"With my wounds, I should only have a couple of minutes left." Cliff estimated.

The skill was akin to Seeker\'s Surmounting Thought. Only in consumed far lesser calories and energy as compared to Seeker\'s forceful pushing of his boundaries.

The scene before Cliff was the same scene happening in the real world. In truth, it was the manifestation of Cliff\'s memories. It was barely a millisecond, but Cliff had limited his unlocking and only applied it to form this world.

He was the first among the different in Seeker\'s memories. And now, he was far more powerful. The first Selective Unlocking apart from Arthur, Lennox, and Eagle.

Of course, Cliff intends to hide this from Seeker and never show even a hint of it.

The relativity of time was different in Cliff\'s memories. Just like how dreams would somehow prolong or shorten time, so was the state of Cliff. The memories of the few seconds before him emerged in his mind.

Cliff immediately started doing his work.

Cliff reviewed the last attacks of Gardo and took note of it.

In his memories, he reviewed how the bullets exited the gun.

Time moved forward and back. Cliff could fast forward and rewind his memories, and while others could do it, it wasn\'t as precise and time-stopping as Cliff\'s.

He pushed the speed of his memories to reach an extremely slow speed. This was the first time Gardo shot him.

Cliff noticed the bullet. He took note of how it suddenly changed trajectory. Then he fast-forwarded his memory to the second attack as he witnessed the volley of bullets. He paused and reviewed how the bullets exploded out and noted the tech that was used.

"Pangean Diverse Metal… So that\'s how he uses it!" Cliff recalled the notes he studied.

Diverse Metal technology was one of the primary reasons how Pangea achieved its study and developed machines and devices that could contain Solarium and Eradication technology. It was a science that had constructed a unique metal of strange composition that could heat and cool itself according to its memory of how it was made. It wasn\'t hard, but because of the way it can change temperature, it would be capable of containing the dangerous and highly explosive nature of Solarium and Eradication.

"So the first bullets had the memory of being cooled down and suddenly heating erupting on a certain side of the bullet, triggering the explosive powders making the bullet change direction. The second bullets all erupted…" Cliff was in deep thought.

The bullets either had certain ports that allow it to suddenly change direction midair through the use of a secondary explosion which redirects it. The other use was to self-destruct the entire bullet creating a mini-shot gun slug.

"And each bullet is equipped with Pangean Eradication. So I only have a few minutes left to live… So this is another scenario facing Arthur and those nerds of his…" Cliff continued to mumble as he recalled the moments of defeat against Arthur\'s team.

"Luckily apart from the first attack… the rest only did minor wounds. I can\'t believe that my prosthetic leg saved me there." Cliff couldn\'t help but look down on his leg which was now full of holes. If it was a normal leg he would have fewer minutes to live as the Eradication tech would have corroded his leg.

"Now how to evade this…?" Cliff continued to ponder.

"I don\'t have to guess where the bullets are going! I just need to know where he was aiming! That\'s it!"

Cliff then moved the scene to the recent gun attacks of Gardo.

Cliff noted where Gardo aimed and fire and used the previous attacks as a base to simulate where the bullets would go.

Suddenly, the scene before Cliff had moved forward as if it was real!

"What the?!" Cliff was stunned. He was sure this was his memory world. Yet now, a real scene occurred in his memory as the bullets were flying on its own as if the attack continued.

"Could it be…? My power isn\'t just memory?" Cliff mumbled dumbly. He was surprised at how detailed his imaginations were.

Cliff stood curiously and allowed the bullets to move on its path.

The mystery was that his brain utilized the memories of the first attacks and created an estimate of where the bullets would hit.

Cliff, however, remained silent. He was not like Arthur. He knew that these were but his guesses based on his memories and would not be reliable.

"Do I risk it?" Cliff pondered as he observed several

Cliff continued to consider several possibilities. Each time he changed his thinking, the scene before him would change.

"Oh, whatever. I lost against the Covenant because of overthinking. I\'ll just use this again." Cliff decided to act.

The moment Cliff left his world of dreams, the bullets started flying. Cliff didn\'t move and allowed the bullets to move when suddenly, a series of minor explosions rang out.

With Cliff\'s perception of time, a second already could be five seconds long. As immediate as Cliff left his world, he dove back in again.

His memories were refreshed and he could see the bullets clearly and how it all exploded.

There were two smaller explosions and one stronger one.

Cliff decided to look at things from the least dangerous to the more dangerous.

The first bullet that Gardo fired came to view.

Cliff noticed that these bullets had erupted in a way that is divided into two bullets.

"Whoa. It\'s aiming for two parallel directions… Whoa! I used the word parallel for the first time in my life!" Cliff realized then suddenly put on a serious look as he returned to the real world.

He turned to the second bullet and noted its peculiar design.

"This one should have a way of exploding on impact and can shoot a piece of it backward. Dangerous… Dangerous…" Cliff muttered. Finally, Cliff turned to the last bullet.

It was large, gaudy and had a bright reddish glow. In Cliff\'s memories, this bullet was still in the process of exploding. But for some strange reasons, the explosion was happening on the front of the bullet.

"Wouldn\'t that slow the speed of this bullet?" Cliff pondered.

He then discovered that some parts at the back of the bullet were about to burst.

"Ugh… how despicable. It\'s larger and brighter than the rest of the bullets. It exploded on the front to slow its speed down. Was it meant to be a bullet to distract his enemies with its bright lights? Then that means, that explosion at the back was meant to make the bullet fly faster again." Cliff shivered at the thought of fighting this man if he didn\'t have the powers of his extreme memories.

"Let\'s see where my imagination will take this…"

Cliff\'s imagination suddenly caused all the bullets to fly. The first bullet divided and Cliff noted its path.

The second bullet struck the wall behind Cliff, and a smaller bullet attacked.

The third bullet was moving slowly then suddenly boomed and pierced through Cliff.

"What a genius! He memorized his bullets and can use them effectively! Not to mention his despicable methodology. I hope this guy meets Lowengren." Cliff frowned.

He then returned to the place he was standing and took a deep breath.

"I can do this three more times… And the pain in my shoulder should increase thanks to the Eradication tech of that bullet. Looks like I could die here…" Cliff could only sigh.

"I can\'t believe that I\'m getting excited." Cliff shook his head and wondered just what kind of a man was he becoming.

Cliff took his stance and excitedly left the realms of his dream world.